


far enough

by Ashling



Category: Chronicles of Narnia - All Media Types, Chronicles of Narnia - C. S. Lewis
Genre: F/M, Post-Voyage of the Dawn Treader
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-08
Updated: 2019-09-08
Packaged: 2020-10-04 12:30:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,730
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20471063
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ashling/pseuds/Ashling
Summary: It's like he's been there, waiting for her, this whole time.





	far enough

**Author's Note:**

  * For [nasimwrites](https://archiveofourown.org/users/nasimwrites/gifts).

> hope you enjoy, nasimwrites!  
for the prompt _romantic encounters in creative places_

Though she's back on uni grounds already (Father returned early to work on his new book), Lucy is trying to linger in the last precious summer weeks before she slips under dizzying waves of classes. It's getting late, no longer tastes of raspberries, has turned to early apples stolen from Professor Hargrove's backyard. And she can't stop walking. Running is harder in skirts, and in sight of all of Father's colleagues, but walk Lucy can and does, rambles unchecked across the grounds and through the arboretum and through empty halls and library stacks and yes, even this graveyard. She likes to read the names on the gravestones, doesn't know why. Keeps learning, doesn't know why. The same way she doesn't know why she's so hungry to keep moving. She's heading somewhere, maybe, and that would be all right if she knew where, or knew how to stop.

Anyway it's past sunset and she's in a graveyard and her collared shirt is still a little sticky with sweat from the climb up the apple tree. She's got in her pocket (among other things) a green ribbon Susan let her borrow two months ago and never asked for back, so she fishes that out and sets about typing up her hair off the nape of her neck as best she can in a loose coil when there's a sudden breeze that smells from the north. There's nothing but trees and a chapel to the north, yet the breeze smells like salt. Hands still in her hair, she glances up.

It's like he's been there, waiting for her, this whole time.

For a moment, there's nothing but his dark eyes, and Lucy's chest seizes up. It's been three years since she's been truly afraid of anything, and if this fear comes true, she's done for. They're so different, they have to be, and more than time, there's worlds between, and how did he get here anyway, and where's the other danger, because that's always the way with him, isn't it, there's got to be work at hand, she's not allowed to have him any other way—

Next thing, he's smiling, and she can really only see some gleam of teeth in this faint moonlight, but it's enough. For all the titles and language he could pull out when he needed, for all the gleaming parquetry of the castle and pageantry of the coronation, he's always been easy. At ease. It makes her remember: she used to be, too. She's feels like she's about to be, again, maybe.

"Caspian," she says, her voice untenably high to her own ears.

"Yes?" he says, archly, and then nothing more. He can't. Reason being, she's hurled herself at him across the intervening space, hard enough to _thud _against him. He's gotten a little taller somehow but she can still throw her arms around his neck. She still has Susan's green ribbon clutched in her right hand.

When he puts his arms around her and hugs her back, she thinks she hears him inhale, long and deep, a little shaky. Isn't sure. By the time they pull away and look at each other, his eyes are all mischief again.

"My queen," he says. If he were Edmund or Peter she'd swat his arm for saying _queen_ as lightly as that when she's a sweaty mess in Mary Janes, but he dwells a little on the possessive, like a caress, and by God, he's going to have to do the leaving this time, because she's not going to do it. She's not going to do it.

Focus. "Is it a quest, this time?"

"Yes." His smile widens.

"Well, if it's not six lost lords, what is it this time? Five golden rings? Four calling birds, three French hens, two turtle doves—"

"I think that is something of Earth. I have no idea what you're talking about."

"Were you sent without warning, or do you know why you're here?"

"I know why I'm here."

"And?"

"I have been here two minutes and already found her."

Lucy doesn't understand, or refuses to. There's a faint suggestion in the back of her head, but it's ridiculous. "Is it another war?"

"What? No, we've been at peace since Miraz died."

"Then what happened to your arm?" She had been just aware enough not to jostle it when she leapt at him. It's bound up with some strips of white cloth, good enough for temporary work only. And an ugly bruise is blooming on his forehead, the knuckles on his hand have been skinned besides. She knows the aftermath of a fight when she sees one. 

Caspian shrugs with his good shoulder. "It wasn't easy to get here."

"Werewolves? Giants? Dragons?"

"A witch. Not one you know," he adds hastily, in reply to the expression of horror on her face. "But one with a very useful compass."

Lucy's beginning to feel impatient. If she can only understand the work at hand, then she can understand her place in it. Not only where it begins, but where it ends. She needs to know that. "Why did you need to find me?"

"I didn't need to," Caspian says simply. "I wanted to."

There's a rather tall, flat-topped gravestone a bit off to Lucy's left, so she does what anyone would do at this point. She sits down on it. Hard.

"What about Narnia?" she says.

"It's in steady, grumpy hands."

"Trumpkin."

"Right as always." Caspian looks at her a little more cautiously than before, voice gone gentle: "Lucy?"

"It doesn't make sense. We see each other when you're carrying a sword and I'm carrying a bow. We see each other when Narnia needs it. We're not people, we're a king and a queen."

"One could say that even kings and queens are people."

"You just came to say hello to a friend, then?" Lucy is angry. She can hear it in her own voice. It's unreasonable, but then, so is all of this. "You fought a witch for that?"

"You would rather I hadn't?"

"I would rather you told me the full truth." And there it is. She can see a flicker in his eyes. "Did you think you could hide anything from me?"

"No. Not forever. But I thought we might talk as old friends, for a little while, first."

"Before what? You tell me witch cursed you?"

"Aslan's mane! No." Caspian makes a sharp gesture of frustration with his hands, and then he settles. His voice goes a little quieter now.

Then he begins again.

"I couldn't stop moving, when I got back to Narnia. At first I thought it was because land wasn't as good as the sea, but then there were some skirmishes at sea with Calormene ships over the liberation of Narrowhaven, and that wasn't any good, either. I asked the Centaurs to consult the stars, but they couldn't tell me what was wrong. I felt as if I was going mad."

Lucy knows the feeling, knows it precisely, has been living it herself these past few years. Walking instead of sailing. Books, and even Susan, rather than centaurs. But the feeling in his voice is exactly the same. 

Caspian goes on. "I read many books. Most of them were about you. I kept coming back to your age when you left, and when you returned. Your memories were the same, though you were so much younger than you used to be. And then I kept reading in Narnian history. I didn't know what I was looking for until I found it. There was a queen named Swanwhite, one of the descendants of Frank and Helen, who had left Narnia, just as you left Earth. She said that she'd been nearly fifty in the other world—Atlantis—but when she came back, it was only a few minutes later, and she was young again. I think it works both ways, you see. Anyone who comes into Narnia can spend a life there and return with their old life intact. And anyone who leaves Narnia can do the same. After that, it was easy. Not easy to do, but easy to decide. I journeyed west, beyond Old Telmar. I found the witch, and she tried to kill me, so I killed her instead. I took her compass. I found the White Stag. I caught it. And I wished to see you again."

He looks up now, from the ground to her eyes. Determined, like he's heading into a fray. "I didn't want to tell you all this at first, because I don't know how you court on Earth, but I know you don't ride up with a proposal at once."

"That's right." There's a smile in Lucy's voice, a small one, beginning to grow. "We don't even ride, usually."

Caspian returns that smile, but without his customary ease. "I know it's not right to go as fast as this, with no encouragement, and no assurances. I know it isn't honorable. I thought if we could only have a little time together before I said that I could stay, that you might let me. Just to try it."

"What kind of encouragement were you looking for, Caspian?"

"I've never—I'm not sure." He genuinely considers it. "There was that governor's daughter who threw flowers at me from the balcony window. But I don't think that's the same."

Lucy laughs outright and stands up. "Come here."

This time, when she puts her arms around his neck, there's nothing urgent in it. She can afford to kiss him slow if they really do have a lifetime of encouragements ahead.

His hands settled on her hips, and he presses into it, but when she finally draws back, he has nothing to say. His face is a sight. She can't laugh and kiss him again at the same time, but she tries.

"You're not the only one who couldn't stop searching," Lucy says, finally. "I'm still not sure what this all means, or if we get to keep it. But there's a place on the library roof with a good view of the stars, and I want to teach you. You know the Ship and the Hammer and the Leopard, but you don't know the Plough or the Bear. You should, if you do stay. You're the Navigator, after all. Walk with me?" 

Caspian takes her hand.


End file.
